A better browser
Ever since Mozilla switched to a rapid release schedule for its Firefox browser, new versions have lacked the same excitement that came when upgrades were fewer and far between. Be that as it may, Firefox 39 is here, and it brings with it a few interesting additions and changes.
Perhaps the biggest upgrade is the ability to share Hello URLs with social networks -- Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Firefox Hello is Mozilla's attempt to offer online voice and video chat without any proprietary restrictions via the WebRTC standard, which Firefox, Chrome, and Opera all support. That said, there are some benefits unique to Firefox users, such as one-click calling.
Firefox 39 also boasts support for Unicode 8.0 skin tone emoji, smoother animation and scrolling (Mac OS X), and SafeBrowsing malware detection lookups for downloads (Mac OS X and Linux).
In addition to a few new features, Firefox 39 stomps out a bunch of bugs, including four critical ones, two that are rated high, half a dozen moderate bugs, and one minor (low) security vulnerability.
Mozilla's seen Firefox's share of the desktop browser market decline in recent years. According to Net Applications, Firefox is installed on just over 12 percent of all desktop PCs, down from 15.54 percent a year ago and 18.29 percent at the end of July in 2013.
In the same time period, Chrome has gone from a 17.76 percent share (July 2013) to 27.23 percent (end of June 2015), which is about half of Internet Explorer's share (54 percent). What all those numbers mean is Chrome is growing in popularity at the expense of Firefox and could challenge IE for the top spot in another year or so (at the current pace).
StatCounter paints a similar overall picture, except that it has Chrome in the top spot with a 52.82 percent share, followed by IE at 20.15 percent and Firefox at 17.59 percent.
Follow Paul on Google+, Twitter, and Facebook
From maximumpc
from http://bit.ly/1KLnTCY
